I'm interested in names.

And sometimes I ask my correspondents if there is a story behind theirs. After hearing from Moses Lake's Vaughn Blethen, I first inquired if she was related to the newspaper publishing family.

She is, if you go way back. But that's really a different branch of the family.

Then I asked about her first name. She told me the story.

"I was supposed to be a Catherine, after my great grandmother. But the day I was born, a little girl in Texas fell down a well and died. So my mother didn't want to use that name.

"I think she must have been under the influence of anesthesia, because she decided to name me after my father (Vaughn Owen Carey). So my name is Vaughn Ann. I've had chance encounters with one weatherman named Vaughn (a male) and one woman with the name Vaughn (not sure how she got hers). But yes, you're right. It is unusual for a female name.

"I get a lot of mail to Mr. Vaughn Blethen. As a teen, I was invited to join the Boy Scouts."

---

---